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Monday, September 25, 2017

It's time for the Four to lead us somewhere worthwhile; using AI and big data to drive success at Coca-Cola; five industries that will be transformed by voice; it's hard to insure self-driving planes; top attributes of good customer experience; the C-suite finally realizes the power of social media; Toys R Us writes a new chapter (11); Walmart makes it possible for all customers to shop online; Amazon is making Whole Foods like a traditional grocery store; Twitter heads to Washington; Facebook details a plan to address election interference; the music industry is growing; Equifax still can't get it right; Uber loses London; how to write a proper cease and desist letter; measuring PR with a communications stack; the difference between open- and closed-minded people; and more in the Follow at Your Own Discretion edition of The Full Monty from Brain+Trust for the week of September 25, 2017.

We've got all of these links — and those that didn't make the cut for publication — in The Full Monty Magazine on Flipboard.

Top Stories

The Four — Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple — have been granted cult-like and carte blanche status for some time. L2 founder Scott Galloway argues that the worm has turned and it's time they accepted more responsibility as they touch the third rail (politics) and continue to gain massive scale that affects wide swaths of the economy. For example:

Amazon should make its second headquarters in Detroit to commit to revitalizing the heart of America;

Apple should stop with the tax avoidance already;

Facebook needs a Night Watch and a CEO who identifies as American rather than global and who will stand up to Russian meddling;

Google is the most vulnerable as the war on tech in Europe escalates; it needs to demonstrate good corporate citizenship.

Facebook and Google’s advertising platforms are out of control. That used to be a good thing. Now…not so much. John Batelle looks at how we got here: Facebook took nearly all the world-beating characteristics of Google’s AdWords and added the crack cocaine of personal data, while programmatic rose. What does the future hold? At stake is not only the fundamental advertising models that built our most valuable tech companies, but also the essential forces and presumptions driving our system of democratic capitalism.

What does the future hold? At stake is not only the fundamental advertising models that built our most valuable tech companies, but also the essential forces and presumptions driving our system of democratic capitalism.

Amazon is working on Alexa-enabled smart glasses. The company is said to be developing a pair of normal-looking eyeglasses that tether to your smartphone and allow you hear, and presumably speak to, Alexa via a bone-conduction audio system. Being able to tap Alexa as your digital assistant without opening an app to do it could be a big differentiator for Amazon.

And here from the Content Marketing Institute, are the content marketing trends to watch for 2018. They include original content, acquisitions, marketing as a profit center, increasing content budgets, and a turf war ramping up between PR/communications and marketing.

THIS WEEK IN RETAIL:

But it's more than just financing that's at stake; the challenge ahead for Toys R Us is how to grapple with the changing digital landscape and sell toys in an increasing digital world. Toys R Us was not built to handle toys on-demand. And when kids (and adults) want toys now, they want them now!

Our fears are misplaced in focusing on what Scott Galloway calls the Four. We should instead be worrying about the One: one firm that will come to dominate search, hardware and cloud computing, that will control a vast network of far-flung businesses, that can ravage entire sectors of the economy simply by announcing its interest in them. You can probably guess who that is.

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AR/VR

Ford and Microsoft are joining forces on car design using HoloLens, disrupting the traditional automotive design process. Being able to reconfigure on the fly and view the vehicle the way a customer would are eminently more affordable with VR.

Program of the Week: This week, check out Up and Vanished, suggested by Jason Peck. It's an investigative podcast that follows a case that went cold with no leads: the murder of a teacher in a small Georgia town. Do you have a program to recommend? Add yours to our Google Sheet: smonty.co/yourpodcasts.

Regulatory / Security

Business disruptions in the legal, regulatory, and computer security fields, from hacking to the on-demand economy and more.

LEGAL

If you're going to write a cease and desist letter, try following the example of Netflix's counsel, who wrote a friendly and humorous missive to fans of Stranger Things, who had created a pop-up bar without the proper licensing and permission. See? Even lawyers can be human.

Measurement / Analytics / Data

The future is not in plastics, but in data. Those who know how to measure and analyze it will rule the world.

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Brain+Trust Partners helps smart, risk-taking executives discern the real from the hype. From strategy development to technology and data vendor selection, to digital transformation and streamlining processes, our focus is on the customer experience. And our decades of experience working for major brands means that we deeply understand the challenges you're facing. Let us know if we can help you.

Monday, September 18, 2017

Silicon Valley tech companies are being asked to step up, and they need to act; understanding AI requires us to first understand humans; we might get too complacent about self-driving technology; focus not on Millennials or moms, but on Corpsumers; news of fake news puts more trust in the news (got it?); why people don't like to buy groceries online; WPP demands more of Twitter; Facebook shuts down ad capabilities on salacious content; you can see ABBA in concert; billions are going into original content on Hulu, Netflix, Amazon and Facebook; Spotify goes for text; more on the Equifax breach; the complex financing of ride-hailing companies; why we're unlikely to undertake experiences that will improve us; and more in the Knock That Off edition of The Full Monty from Brain+Trust for the week of September 18, 2017.

We've got all of these links — and those that didn't make the cut for publication — in The Full Monty Magazine on Flipboard.

Top Stories

The tech world is becoming decidedly intertwined with the political world: anti-trust matters, regulatory issues, privacy concerns, control over media — it's all leading to more scrutiny as some sense There's Blood in the Water in Silicon Valley.

Facebook may have addressed its controversial feature that allowed advertisers to target people based on race, but the social network didn't tell its algorithm not to further generate offensive ad categories. ProPublica found that until this week, when they asked Facebook about it, the world’s largest social network enabled advertisers to direct their pitches to the news feeds of almost 2,300 people who expressed interest in the topics of “Jew hater,” “How to burn jews,” or, “History of ‘why jews ruin the world.” The company then removed that capability. Too bad it had to be uncovered by the media for them to do anything about it.

Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Autonomous

The latest in AI, machine learning, bots, and autonomous everything.

While artificial intelligence seems to be the main focus of many industries these days, before we're successful at AI we need to understand more about humans. Let's start with as simple one: can anyone help me understand my teenager? Okay, maybe that's not all that simple.

"She is so human that millions of people are eager to talk to her. When Xiaoice was released for a public test on WeChat (a popular messaging and calling app in China) on May 29 of last year, she received 1.5 million chat group invitations in the first 72 hours. Many people said that they didn’t realize she isn’t a human until 10 minutes into their conversation." Your next new best friend might be a robot. AKA the largest Turing test in human history.

Meanwhile, how does Ford test people's reactions to autonomous vehicles when unsupervised cars are still illegal on the street? Simple: they throw on a ghost suit. Remember that van with the driver disguised as a seat in the August. 14 edition? This is it.

We know that Amazon is trying to take on Walmart with its purchase of Whole Foods and push into online grocery shopping. But that may be for naught, as currently, people don't like to buy their groceries online. The main reason? Hint: seeing is believing.

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Want to know what 500 marketers (budgets up to $10 million) believe and how those beliefs influence their behaviors when it comes to hiring and firing agencies just like yours?

TWITTER/ PERISCOPE

WPP's Sir Martin Sorrell took Twitter's Jack Dorsey to task on the platform's lagging growth rate in comparison to rivals. Dorsey admitted the social platform needs to "deliver what matters in the moment and what's relevant to people" and acknowledged that it needs a simple advertising model to boost revenue.

FACEBOOK / INSTAGRAM / WHATSAPP

Facebook wants creators to make money, but not through content related to violence, p*rn, drugs, hate, debated social issues, and other content types. The company has released guidelines on ad content that prohibit monetization in such questionable categories.

Researchers at the University of Iowa and Lahore University of Management Science in Pakistan say a security loophole has allowed at least a million Facebook accounts, both real and fake, to generate at least 100 million "likes" and comments as part of "a thriving ecosystem of large-scale reputation manipulation."

AR/VR

And if you're like us, you may have been asking yourself, "How can I see ABBA in concert?" Well, your timing is impeccable. ABBA is indeed going on tour again for the first time in 35 years. In virtual reality.

Media

The latest in the world of streaming video, audio, and the advertising, pricing and bundling models related to them.

AUDIO

After months of looking for a buyer and experimenting with a new on-demand streaming service, Pandora is trying to become the old Pandora again by refocusing its efforts on ad-supported radio. As the leader in streaming media, Pandora may find itself well served by returning to its roots. Then again, it wasn't surrounded by the sharp elbows of Spotify then.

Program of the Week: This week, Andrea Bloom recommends Pop Culture Happy Hour, the NPR offering that promises a lively chat about books, movies, music, television, comics and pretty much anything else that strikes a nerve. Do you have a program to recommend? Add yours to our Google Sheet: smonty.co/yourpodcasts.

Regulatory / Security

Business disruptions in the legal, regulatory, and computer security fields, from hacking to the on-demand economy and more.

SECURITY / HACKING:

The Equifax Breach:

We're a week in, and here's what you need to know — a handy FAQ from Krebs on Security, including how to freeze your credit.

It really was a perfect storm, including no corporate leadership board involvement in security, an underperforming website, a bumbling crisis team. Who would have guessed a company that named itself after a Fax would fail to be armed for modern threats?

New York Times reporter Mike Isaac is writing a book about Uber. Ambition, betrayal, sex, deceit and power grabs will make it a page-turner. And that's before we even get out of Travis Kalanick's office...

Good leaders need to learn to be the last to speak. It gives others in the room the sense that what they have to say matters, and it gives the leader a chance to listen to all of the input before saying anything. Straight from Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (Habit 5: "seek first to understand before seeking to be understood."). And something I saw first hand at Ford Motor Company under the capable and inspirational leadership of Alan Mulally.

Do you like what you see here? Please subscribe to have trends on digital communications, marketing, technology and business delivered to your inbox each Monday.

Wow! You made it this far. That took a lot of work. Can you imagine how much work it took to write this? If you can appreciate the effort and this publication provides any kind of value to you, maybe you'll consider joining as a patron.

Brain+Trust Partners helps smart, risk-taking executives discern the real from the hype. From strategy development to technology and data vendor selection, to digital transformation and streamlining processes, our focus is on the customer experience. And our decades of experience working for major brands means that we deeply understand the challenges you're facing. Let us know if we can help you.

Monday, September 11, 2017

Equifax is equif___d; a data-based guide for implementing AI into business strategies; angry customers are advancing AI; legislation to move autonomous driving forward; social media as a source of news from Pew Research; Nordstrom goes sans merch; Amazon is looking for a second HQ; in-app tweetstorm composing; Twitter, Facebook, and the Russia problem; Facebook has a slew of transparency issues; broadband surpasses TV subscribers; Spotify and Hulu are offering a bundle; the silent Alexa hacker; the FTC gets serious with influencers; OMG turns 100 (OMG!); and more in the Mother of All Data Breaches edition of The Full Monty from Brain+Trust for the week of September 11, 2017.

While it may not have been the largest of data breaches, it's by far the worst because personal data was compromised. It's not like you can change your date of birth, Social Security Number of your mother's maiden name. Not to mention that credit freezes may hamper consumer spending, which in turn could impact the economy.

“To find out if your Equifax data has been compromised, log on to our Web site and enter your e-mail address, date of birth, Social Security number, credit-card number, and mother’s maiden name.” — Via The New Yorker

What's pushing AI forward? Angry customers that deal with virtual assistants. Think about it: Alexa, Siri and Google Assistant only get the best you; it's the irate customers that are testing the limits of artificial intelligence (and helping it to learn).

One of the first steps in getting there is legislative approval. Well, the good news is that last week, the House of Representatives passed the SELF DRIVE Act — that's Safely Ensuring Lives Future Deployment and Research In Vehicle Evolution (aside: there's got to be a whole Congressional body that's responsible for the clever naming of legislation!).

THIS WEEK IN RETAIL:

Nordstrom is opening a new store next month that is a fraction of the size of its typical locations, where shoppers will be able to enjoy services such as manicures and on-site tailoring. But the store will not have any merchandise. Interesting angle: embrace the experience while embracing online shopping.

Over the course of the last year, with plenty of political outrage to go around, we've seen the platform used in ways it wasn't initially intended. We speak of course of the rise of the Twitter thread.

The company has responded by making a tweak to the app that it may roll out to users in short course: an in-app tweetstorm feature that will allow users to create an entire thread/tweetstorm before sending the very first tweet. To which we reply: covfefe.

Facebook organic reach has declined significantly and increases in paid promotion have not enabled brands and publishers to maintain their levels of Facebook engagement. Moreover, the biggest fall in engagement was with image posts and link posts. Videos get twice the level of engagement of link and image posts. There couldn't be a more a clear-cut demonstration of Facebook gaming the system to guarantee more video consumption.

Perhaps it's a good time to look at this in-depth critique of Facebook and how its quest for growth and monetization shapes and distorts company's stated mission of simply connecting people via the London Review of Books.

ALPHABET / GOOGLE / YOUTUBE

More than four in 10 teen YouTube users ages 12 to 17 say there are too many ads on the platform, according to a January 2017 survey from Forrester Research. eMarketer projects that 23.2 million 12- to 17-year-olds will watch digital video monthly this year.

Media

The latest in the world of streaming video, audio, and the advertising, pricing and bundling models related to them.

Facebook is offering music labels hundreds of millions of dollars to cover infringing music in user-uploaded videos, as it improves its copyright flagging technology. Such a move would allow users to include such music in their videos while easing the burden on the copyright team.

The Federal Trade Commission is warning a handful of Instagram influencers to disclose their business ties when they're posting something related to a sponsor. Letters sent to these 21 influencers cite specific posts that violate the FTC's Endorsement Guidelines. Each complaint can tally $40,000. Please let it include a Kardashian. Please let it include a Kardashian. Please let it include a Kardashian.

Measurement / Analytics / Data

The future is not in plastics, but in data. Those who know how to measure and analyze it will rule the world.

Good analytics tools do more than just push data out. They help you understand what’s driving those numbers by segmenting every metric and KPI you have. If you want to better understand your marketing funnel, drill down into key segments.

Mental Nourishment

Other links to help you reflect, improve, or simply learn something new.

Do you think OMG began in the era of texting? Try again. Over the phone? Not even close. We're actually celebrating the centennial of OMG: a Septemer 9, 1917 letter to Winston Churchill. You can thank Lord Fisher, who was lampooning the abbreviations of new titles being introduced by George V: MBE, OBE, CBE, KBE, and GBE. But there's no truth to the rumor that he was to be made an Earl and an OBE: an Earlobe.

Do you like what you see here? Please subscribe to have trends on digital communications, marketing, technology and business delivered to your inbox each Monday.

Wow! You made it this far. That took a lot of work. Can you imagine how much work it took to write this? If you can appreciate the effort and this publication provides any kind of value to you, maybe you'll consider joining as a patron.

Brain+Trust Partners helps smart, risk-taking executives discern the real from the hype. From strategy development to technology and data vendor selection, to digital transformation and streamlining processes, our focus is on the customer experience. And our decades of experience working for major brands means that we deeply understand the challenges you're facing. Let us know if we can help you.

Top photo credit: Hurricane by Winslow Homer, courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.